As it is generally known, collaborative software system users may work with large lists of collaborative partners and components in a computer desktop environment. Such collaborative partners and components include instant messaging contacts, Web addresses, events, collaborative documents, activity objects, and computer desktop applications. As a result of the size of such lists, it can be time consuming for the user to find certain partners or components that they collaborate with frequently.
Some existing computer desktop applications, such as e-mail applications, instant messaging applications, and calendaring applications, provide alphabetical sorting of lists they display to help with this problem. However, these features are typically insufficient with regard to solving the general problem of quickly locating a collaborative partner or component in a large list.
For example, instant messaging systems are a type of collaboration software system in which this problem is commonly encountered. As it is generally known, instant messaging is a form of real-time (or “synchronous”) communication between two or more users. In typical instant messaging systems, text and other types of information is conveyed among the users involved in an instant messaging session via application programs running on computers connected over a data communication network such as the Internet. Typical instant messaging systems require the use of a client program associated with an instant messaging service. Instant messaging differs from electronic mail (“e-mail”) and other asynchronous communication systems in that instant messaging sessions occur in real-time, with all session participants simultaneously on-line. Most existing instant messaging services offer a presence information feature, visually indicating to a local user the on-line status (e.g. “on-line”, “off-line”, “unavailable”, etc.) of users of interest to the local user. The list of users of interest to the local user, is referred to herein for purposes of explanation as the local user's “contact list”. A user's contact list continuously indicates to him or her which users of interest are currently available for an instant messaging session. Existing systems also provide the ability for a user to categorize the users within their contact list into various groups. Examples of existing instant messaging services on the public Internet include AOL® Instant Messenger (AIM), Google® Talk, iChat, ICQ, Jabber, Skype, Trillian and Yahoo!® Messenger.
For instant messaging system users with relatively large contact lists (e.g. containing over one hundred contacts), and/or a large number of user groups within their contact list, finding a particular contact in the contact list to start an instant messaging session with can be significantly time consuming. In most existing instant messaging applications (e.g. AIM and Yahoo!® Messenger), the user is provided with the option of sorting contacts alphabetically within the contact list to help with this problem. However, if the identifiers of users in the contact list are aliases (e.g. nicknames or e-mail addresses), it may still be difficult to remember the aliases/e-mail addresses of all users in the contact list. Accordingly, as seen in the example of instant messaging collaboration software systems, alphabetical sorting does not necessarily result in providing the user with the ability to quickly locate a specific collaborating partner or component within a large list.
Some existing systems have provided sorting of components and/or collaborating partners in a user interface that prominently shows the most recently accessed files or most recent accessing people. However, such existing systems also do not effectively predict the components and/or collaborating partners that are most likely to be accessed.
For the above reasons it would be desirable to have a new system for providing a user interface to an collaborative software system, such as an instant messaging system, that provides a representation of a list of collaborating partners or components, such as an instant messaging system's contact list, that makes it easier for the user to locate a particular collaborating partner and/or component.